


For What It's Worth

by supervillainesses



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Batman: The Animated Series
Genre: F/F, abuse tw
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-11
Updated: 2017-04-10
Packaged: 2018-10-17 12:38:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10594188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/supervillainesses/pseuds/supervillainesses
Summary: After a chance encounter, Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy learn that they make one hell of a team. But Harley is restless, refusing to put down roots when roots are all Pamela has ever wanted. (A commissioned re-imagining of Harley and Ivy's first encounter in B:TAS)





	1. Green All Over

**Author's Note:**

> This is a commission from someone on Tumblr. It's multi-chaptered, but incomplete, I don't know if they'll ever get back to me on finishing it, as it's been a long time. If the response is pretty positive toward me finishing it, I'll try and make a final chapter. I won't leave it unfinished like Fight Back lol

Weather was so quick to match moods in Gotham. Or perhaps citizens were conditioned to match their dispositions to the constant gloom and rain. Whatever the reason, Harley was feeling the weight of every heavy gray cloud on her shoulders. That was how it always went—something terrible happened, and the heroine would end up walking sadly in the rain through the fallout. The only difference was that she wasn't so much walking as she was limping, and that Harley was far from heroic.

Usually she loved the rain. No one in the city could puddle-jump quite like she could. Tonight she could barely drag her feet through the small pools of water, each step its own form of quiet torture. The rough, grimy wall of the alley scraped the heel of her hand as she lost balance, landing harshly in a puddle, unable to catch herself in time. Dazed, she rolled over, staring up into the endless dark gray of the Gotham sky.

Mascara streaked down her cheeks and into her hair, either from rain or her tears, she wasn't sure. Her cheek was bruised and the sleeve of her costume was torn, a long cut burned at the touch of lightly polluted rainwater to skin. But no ounce of this pain could compare to the look on Mr. J's face when he had thrown her from the house.

_It's all your fault_ , she thought. _You messed up, you made him mad, and now we're dealin' with the consequences_.

Puddin had been so upset when they had returned from yet another unsuccessful run-in with the Batman. The plan had gone up in smoke and a number of the henchmen had been wrangled, probably already admitted to Blackgate. Upon their return, Joker had flung himself into his favorite armchair, gripping the leather tight in his fingers, staring with blank rage with teeth gritted. His expression didn't even let up when Harley put on a tape of _The Three Stooges_ for him.

Harley decided to make herself useful and get something to eat going, figuring at least part of the problem was that fighting the Bat had taken a lot out of him. An hour later, the pork chops were finished, potatoes were mashed, and lemonade was poured. An old fashioned meal for an old fashioned man.

"Come and get it, Puddin!" Harley called happily as she set the plates down. A moment later, and still no response. "Puddin?"

Still he sat in that chair, now staring at nothing but TV static from however long ago the tape had ended. Not easily deterred, she took up his plate and glass and placed it on a TV tray beside him. Sitting on the arm of the chair, she read his expression entirely wrong, she realized in hindsight. He hadn't been withdrawn and sad, he had been carefully coiled up in rage. But it was too late; she placed an arm around his shoulders and he uncoiled like a snake, standing to his feet to grab her by the shoulders, slap her, and shove her to the ground. The food went crashing to the floor, the glass and china breaking into hundreds of pieces. At the sound of the commotion Bud and Lou came rushing in, immediately diving on the discarded dinner. That seemed to only make him angrier.

"How many times have I told you?" He nudged her with the pointy end of his shoe. " _Don't bother daddy when he's watching television!_ "

"B-But Puddin!" Harley tried to smile through the burn of the blow to her face. "You haven't eaten all day! I was just tryin' ta take care of you!"

She moved toward him again, and he shoved her away. This time, when she fell, she landed on the glass, and instantaneously she began to bleed. Lou lapped at her wound while Bud lay cowering in fear beneath a nearby end table, out of both the thunder and of Joker.

"I don't _need_ your help, you shrew! No one has ever needed you, and no one ever will! Get out, get out, get out!"

Her begging and pleading had gone unheard, and he threw her from their home, bruising both of her legs in her fall. Now he she lay in Crime Alley.

Through the sheaths of rain, Harley spied a tall figure descending from the rooftop of the alleyway side. At first, she thought it might have been Batman, and was almost grateful for it. At least at Arkham she'd have medical treatment and the comfort of being around friends. But it wasn't the Bat; he didn't travel around on vines and have legs for days.

"You're that plant lady," Harley tried to sit up as the woman approached. "Poison Oaky."

"Ivy." She corrected her with a stern tone, but her expression softened a bit as she stared at her.

"Yeah, I know, I know." Harley grunted, sitting up fully with great effort. "I remember that from your file, back when I worked at Arkham. Didja just spring yourself?"

"I did, and I spotted your costume from the rooftop. You're the doctor who became Harley Quinn, right?"

"The one and—fuck—only," Harley grunted, holding her sides. Bruises, bruises everywhere. "Been almost a whole year since I quit, can't— _fuck—_ wait until people forget."

"You're bleeding, who did this to you?" Ivy knelt beside her, seeming to not care whether it got her green tights dirty. Her long red hair slid off of her shoulder, revealing the smooth skin of her neck. Harley blushed.

"Batman," she answered, wincing as Ivy palpated her ribs.

"Nothing broken," she muttered. "And that's funny, considering he's currently chasing me."

"He's a busy guy?"

There was a sudden noise as something heavy fell from somewhere not far off. Ivy tensed and her green eyes, so intense, narrowed.

"Let's get out of here. Can you stand?"

Harley struggled, managing to pull herself to her knees. "Kinda."

Ivy made a sound somewhere between a grunt and a sigh, draped one of Harley's arms around her shoulders, and hefted her to her feet. Harley blushed, both at how surprisingly strong the redheaded woman was, and the unexpected perfume of her hair.

"Don't take this as creepy," Harley laughed a little as they headed off, "but you smell nice."

"It's the pheromones," Ivy answered. "Don't worry. Women are usually immune to them."

The devilish smirk on Ivy's face made her feel safer than the arm around her waist.

* * *

 

The house was nothing special, just as drab and overgrown as the rest of the tightly packed houses in the neighborhood. Harley supposed it kept the place hard to find. Instead of a key, Ivy pressed her palm to the door, and tiny vines slithered their way into the keyhole, working the tumblers until the door popped open.

"It isn't much," Ivy turned on the lights as Harley hobbled inside, "but it's home."

"Not much?" Harley echoed breathily. "No rats, no moldy pizza boxes, and no weird smell in the air? This is paradise, Red!"

"Red?" Ivy repeated.

"Heh," Harley chuckled sheepishly, cradling her wounded arm. "I like your red hair, and red is my favorite color, after all. Sorry if it's pushy of me."

"No, it's fine," Ivy shrugged. "Any name is fine, so long as it isn't the name I was born with."

"Why's that?"

Ivy turned her gaze away. "Pamela is dead."

A small silence fell heavy in the air. "I can relate."

"Has the bleeding stopped?" Ivy threw a blanket over the curtain rod, giving one last peek outside before doing the same to another window. "If so I'd like to clean it, apply some salves, maybe even dress it."

"Ah gee, that'd be nice!" Harley watched the redheaded woman as she flitted about the room, taking security measures to help ensure the Bat couldn't find them. Oddly, her gaze was transfixed on how she moved—the sway of her hips, the sultry swing in her step, all beautiful and effortless.

After a moment, Ivy turned toward her. "Well?"

Harley shook herself. "What?"

"Has the bleeding stopped?"

"Oh, yeah! Sorry."

Ivy pursed her lips, and began climbing the stairs. "You should shower. I only have one bed, so we'll share. I don't get many visitors. The shower in the master bathroom is nicer, anyway."

"Sleepover!" Excitement rushed through Harley as she followed after her rescuer. "We can braid each other's hair, paint our nails, have a pillow fight, stay up and eat ice cream—"

"I just got out of Arkham. After you shower, I'm going to do the same, and then I'm going to sleep. If you're half as smart as I think, you'll do the same, after your beating from...Batman. But you can stay up if you like."

"Okay, no party tonight," Harley frowned, shivering from the cold. "Tomorrow then?"

Ivy didn't say anything as she opened one of three doors on the top floor of the house. With a flick of a switch, the room was lit with the low golden light of two bedside lamps. Inside the wallpaper was a warm forest green, half of it lined with wood paneling. The queen-size bed was topped with blankets and pillows. Cluttered around the long window were dozens of plants. This was nothing like the hideouts Harley had seen, between Joker's and once Penguin's. If Ivy had a secret lair, it wasn't this. This was her home.

After Ivy filled a small watering can in the bathroom sink, Harley traded places with her and gleefully stripped from her soaking wet costume once the door was closed. The warm water of the shower revived her, but through the steam she could see the definition of the beginnings of bruises. The cut on her arm was long, and though it didn't feel deep the hot water sure made it sting.

The only things in the shower were unmarked mason jars. After a second of testing, Harley found that they foamed in the water, and washed with the mysterious botanical substances. Once finished, she found a towel, dried off a bit, and poked her head out of the bathroom.

"Hey, Red? Can I borrow a shirt?"

Ivy was seated on the edge of the bed facing the wall opposite the bathroom, searching through a wooden box. "Third drawer from the bottom," she gestured to the dresser not three feet from the door.

Clutching the towel to her, Harley kept her eyes on Ivy's back, making sure the older woman didn't turn around and catch her as she slid into the soft blue shirt. It covered her nearly to her knees.

"Let me see your wound," Ivy insisted tiredly.

Harley sat beside her on the bed, and the redhead went to work applying salves. They smelled both sour and sweet, floral yet herbal. Harley hissed when the second salve was administered.

"Yowch!" Harley tried to pull her arm back, but Ivy wouldn't let her. "Y'know, for being made outta some plants this stuff is sure hurting like chemicals."

"Everything is chemicals," Ivy countered. "Mine are just stronger and non-synthetic."

"You're so much of a tree-hugger, ya make your own soaps," Harley laughed.

Ivy's cheeks turned red as she wound the bandage around Harley's arm. "I didn't take you in to be insulted."

"Nah," Harley smiled brightly. "I think it's cute."

Ivy furrowed her brow, not looking at Harley. She said nothing as she climbed into the other side of the bed, and shut off the light, turning her back toward Harley in sleep. Harley stared at the older woman's back for a moment; Ivy stayed at the very edge, as though trying to put as much room between them as possible. Despite the warm shower Harley was still a bit cold, and she wanted to move in closer and curl up behind Ivy for warmth, but she remembered how badly that had ended up when she had tried the same with Joker.

Throwing the idea away, Harley curled up on the other side of the soft bed, clutching as much blanket to herself as she could. It was a nice change to sleep in a bed she didn't have to fear she would be kicked out of in the night.

* * *

 

When Ivy awoke she was acutely aware of the warm breath on the back of her neck, The digital clock face read 1:39am. She sighed, placing her head on her forearm in defeat, knowing sleep would be hard to chase after any longer tonight. Arkham tended to mess up her sleeping patterns, but tonight this was her own fault, going to bed even before 9pm. She turned, expecting Harley to wake as well, her mind creating fleeting imaginings of making the wounded blonde a late night snack of buckwheat pancakes to get her energy up, but she was fast asleep.

_What, you don't have enough space?_ Ivy glared at the empty expanse of bed beyond Harley, but couldn't be too upset because she had a sinking suspicion she had enjoyed the added warmth of another body on hers in her sleep.

She dissected herself from her bedfellow's embrace and made her way for the door. Midway she stepped on Harley's now damp costume. She wadded it up as she made her way downstairs, and threw it into the wash.

_Why did you invite her to stay?_ Ivy thought bitterly as she flicked on the lights of the greenhouse. _You should have just bandaged her up and sent her on her way. It was those damn puppy eyes of hers, she looked lonely. Just like you_.

"Hello, babies," Ivy cooed, brushing her fingers against the long petals of a lily. "Did you miss mommy?"

As always, the plants were gleeful to have her back. Looking at the current state of the greenhouse she wondered if it was the mess that had woken her up. Rubbing the last remains of sleep from her eyes, she went to work.

In the wee hours of the morning, she reentered the house, sunshine streaming in. She found it empty, Harley had gone in the hours after Ivy left the bed. Maybe that was the fault of it. It was all right. Ivy was used to being alone anyway.

* * *

 

Ivy didn't hear from Harley for several months. Off parading around with Joker, no doubt. She was no fool; she knew who had given Harley those bruises. If she had known the younger woman planned on leaving she would have asked her to stay. It was worth humoring her with friendship to keep her from someone who obviously wanted to hurt her.

Spring gave way to summer, and it was a sweltering sunny morning when her plants alerted her to someone approaching her front door. Ivy rolled over in bed, listening as her plants told her of the visitor walked up her steps, and back down, up and down again, indecisive over whether to knock. Definitely not Batman. As if he'd use the front door anyway.

Grumpily, Ivy rose from the bed and slipped a robe over her form for modesty. Once downstairs, she peered through the keyhole, finding Harley Quinn standing on one of the last steps, gnawing on a nail uncertainly. After a moment, the blonde turned on her heel and dashed toward the street.

Unthinkingly, Ivy undid the lock and opened the door. "Harley?"

"Red!" Harley turned so quickly she nearly fell over, but she righted herself on Ivy's mailbox. She bounded up the stairs and greeted her brightly. "Mornin'!"

Ivy sighed and opened the door, stepping aside to let the bubbly blonde inside.

"Hope I didn't wake ya," Harley said, eyeing the robe. "'Course, you could just be wearin' that 'cause you like it. I know I would, if I had your figure," she laughed a little to loudly for so early in the day.

Ivy shook her head as she got better look at Harley. Scratches along her cheek, bruising on her wrist, and something of a limp in her step—her boyfriend was back at it again. But what did Ivy care, she was just another meat bag to be chewed up in the teeth of mankind.

"Why are you here?" Ivy asked, tightening her robe.

"It's Saturday morning, I figured you wouldn't wanna watch cartoons alone." Harley edged toward the living room, her enthusiasm masking her nervousness at being near Ivy once again.

Ivy frowned. "I don't own a television."

"What? Did someone steal it?"

"No, I've never owned one. There's nothing I'd want to watch anyway." She could see the dejection in Harley's face, and decided to press on. "Anyway, I have to prepare the evening."

Ivy flipped her hair over her shoulder and moved into the greenhouse attached through the kitchen, once a garage. She slid out of the robe and pulled out a pair of shorts and a shirt, unaware of Harley behind her watching until she spoke.

"So, you're really green all over?" Harley's eyes were wide, and Ivy couldn't help a smirk. She loved her body. Harley moved over to Ivy's desk, eyeing the blueprints there. "I don't think it's from envy, though, huh? Ha! Williams Hall Event Center? That’s in South Gotham, yeah?"

"Yes, about one mile south. They're hosting an auction tonight, and it will be filled with rich land grabbers."

Harley's eyes widened with excitement. "So you're gonna rob 'em?"

"Likely, yes," Ivy shrugged a slender shoulder. "But, more importantly, there is a vacant lot behind the center. I am growing some of my home grown seeds, and I am returning the building to nature."

"I dunno," Harley shrugged, "I think the stealing and mayhem seems more fun than planting and growing a few weeds."

"They aren't weeds!" Ivy marched toward a long work table where seed pods were scattered across parchment paper. "They're the seeds from my most successfully grown babies and they are very eager to spread over Gotham. Aren't you, darlings?"

"Well, howzabout a compromise?" Harley sat on the desk, and crossed her legs. "You can plant your seeds, but _after that_ we rob the place blind."

"I'm not one for pulling large heists," Ivy turned up her nose. "I only 'break the law' by Man's standards. I'm only helping my young."

Harley frowned. "Well, having more money is still nice, and if we pull it off you can buy yourself the biggest greenhouse money can buy. Even if you don't know much about thievin', no worries. It's my specialty. We'll do my usual split, 30/70. 70 percent to you, 30 to me."

Ivy furrowed her brow. "I say that if we're working together you'll get half of what we earn. It's only fair."

Harley blinked a few times, her expression blank before her face spread into a wide, sunny grin. Ivy felt her heart flutter at the sight; no one, it seemed, expressed their happiness quite like Harley Quinn.

"Only if ya insist, Red," Harley laughed, rubbing the back of her neck.

"Why are you here, Harley?" Ivy asked again.

Harley's fingers went to the scrape on her leg. "I just wanted to see ya, is all. You're so nice, Red. The Arkham guys, they've gotcha all wrong. Or maybe you're just mean to men. Wait, I don't have a costume to wear."

"Your old one from last time is still here," Ivy answered, but hadn't let Harley's change in subject go unnoticed. "I mended the sleeve."

"What, you kept that?" Harley leapt to her feet and hugged Ivy tight. "Red, you're just too good, you know that?"

Ivy relaxed just slightly into the warm embrace, before removing Harley from herself. She wanted to say that it wasn't kindness, it was basic human decency, but her heart wouldn't let her. It was too busy feeling heavy at the realization that it seemed Harley had forgotten what kindness really was. Of course she would, living with _that man_.

"Pull up a chair," Ivy clicked on the desk lamp and sat before the blueprints, "there are only so many hours before the auction."


	2. Not A Chance

            “Gee, Red,” Harley stepped down from Ivy’s vine with her mouth gaping, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many _penguins_ in my life!”

            Harley started laughing at her awful joke referencing the number of men dressed in suits. Ivy rolled her eyes, but she had to admit, from their rooftop view the auction-going men did bear quite a resemblance to waddling penguins. Especially since richer men tended to be…rotund. They could give Cobblepot a run for his money.

            “Listen,” Ivy turned her back to the view below, letting the wind lift her hair from her shoulders. “We’re in, we’re out. As soon as it looks like everyone has arrived and is settled, we pull out our big guns, take what we can, and leave.”

            “And plant ya seeds.”

            “And plant my seeds.”

            “But _Red_ ,” Harley huffed, spinning away from the woman. “Look at ’em all! Look at _us,_ we all look so fancy, there’s gonna be good food—”

            “So?”

            “ _So?_ ” Harley echoed, turning back toward her. “When was the last time you had _fun?_ ”

            Ivy stiffened her bottom lip and faced out at the ground below once again. “I think we have different ideas of what’s _fun_ , Harl.”

            When Harley didn’t reply back, Ivy peeked over in her direction. She was staring at her with a sort of dopey, soppy smile. Ivy bristled, but wasn’t sure why.

            “What?” Ivy snapped.

            “Ya just gave me a nickname,” Harley giggled, and bumped her hip into Ivy’s. “It’s happenin’; we’re gonna be besties, Red.”

            “Oh, _please_ ,” Ivy scoffed.

            “Yup,” the jester roughly wrapped an arm around Ivy’s shoulders, the sequins of her dress snagging on the satin of Ivy’s. “I feel it. Deep down. Right here. In my lil ol’ heart. It’s friendship.”

            Ivy rolled her eyes. “If you say so.”

            No grand entrances for the two of them. Harley picked the lock of a side exit and they followed the sounds of chatter to the ballroom where the auction was to be held within the hour.

            The party was filled to the brim with people, each one reeking of eagerness and wealth. To Ivy, the combined scents always reminded her of vinegar and too much sweat. She loathed mingling with them, but Harley latched onto her arm desperately as they moved into the crowd, and any urge to run was taken away, replaced with the memory of the job at hand.

            _Annoying,_ Ivy thought, but still didn't remove the blonde from her arm. There were some gay socialites among Gotham's wealthy, some of which were in attendance, so luckily they didn't stand out.

            But they didn't exactly blend in. The crowd was transfixed on them when they walked past—Harley admittedly looked stunning in the borrowed blue gown she wore, and Ivy was used to eyes being on her when she walked into a room. The room's eyes on their asses were preferable to their eyes on the large handbag Harley had stashed their weapons in.

            “Hey, Red, ya mind if I have a snack before the big event? It's been hours since lunch and I think I spy lobster on that buffet table.”

            Ivy rolled her eyes. Whatever. It wasn't as if this was her main plan for the evening anyway. “Ten minutes. Eat quickly.”

            “Aye, aye!”

            Harley saluted before leaning forward to peck Ivy on the cheek, too quickly for her to counter. Ivy stood there with a hand pressed to her reddening cheek, her face heated with what could only be embarrassment, no matter what the butterflies in her stomach tried to tell her in their strange language of fluttering wings. This wasn't good; contact with her skin was poisonous to humans. A peck on the cheek wouldn't do much but if Harley insisted on being so close she'd have to pull out those immunizations she'd been testing.

            _Are you seriously going to immunize her against your one defense?_ Ivy silenced the voice in her head and sent a text to her ex Harvey Dent. Mostly out of boredom. He still hadn't forgiven her for nearly killing him, but honestly what was the harm if he survived? Besides, parties were no fun if she wasn't out to seduce and make a fool of some pathetic man, and Harvey's anger was always so fun to poke at.

* * *

 

            Harley was a little misty-eyed; she’d never seen so much food in her life. With a palm pressed to her chest, she recited a brief Hebrew food blessing before diving in. She’d never had lobster before, but now she was piling four bright red tails onto a plate and no one was slapping her hand away from reaching for more. Ivy certainly had style, and she wasn’t the only one noticing.

            “I’ve _never_ seen her before,” a tall brunette in a forest green gown said to her friend, just behind Harley in line. Harley wasn’t one for judging people, but she only had a salad on her plate with all of this great food around. Unless she had a gluten allergy it seemed a bit ungrateful in her book. “That leggy redhead, anyone catch her name?”

            “Bonnie, you’re insatiable,” her shorter friend was a bit wiser and had a plate piled high with crab legs. “She must be a newcomer, maybe one of those new internet millionaires? You know, some punk kid who founded a blogging site almost bumped Brucie from his rank as Gotham’s wealthiest bachelor.”

            “No! What happened?”

            “Turned out the site stole your information and shipped it off to far-flung countries for a pretty penny. Audrey’s daughter was one of his backers; the family lost it big when the site went under.”

            “Hilda how is it you know simply _everything_?” Harley almost gagged at Bonnie’s excitement over Hilda’s eager gossip, but didn’t want to risk losing even a single scrap of this food.

            “It’s a gift,” Hilda’s narrow eyes landed on Harley. “Say, you came in with Jessica Rabbit over there.”

            Harley nearly choked. “Ex-queeze me?”

            “She’s _gorgeous_ ,” Bonnie sighed, biting her nail and grinning naughtily in the direction of Ivy, who was on her phone and oblivious to the room around her. “Exactly my type.”

            Harley swallowed hard around a bite of potatoes au gratin, somewhat perturbed by the knowledge that Bonnie would be exactly Ivy’s type, too. Tall and sensual with a gait full of swaying hips. She glanced over at Ivy again, who was now taking a call and grinning devilishly. Her eyes locked with Harley’s and she waved a little. When she turned away, Harley couldn’t help but admire the curve of her backside.

            “You said the same thing about Selina Kyle,” Hilda rolled her eyes.

            “And she was into me, too, until Bruce Wayne showed up. So spill, Blondie. Are you and Ms. Legs-for-days an item? What’s her name?”

            Harley bristled and harshly slapped her plate down onto the table. “Ivy.”

            “Ivy?” Bonnie echoed.

            “Yeah, as in _Poison_ Ivy, as in _EVERYBODY FREEZE, THIS IS A HOLD-UP!_ ”

            Ivy was beside her in a flash, with a bemused expression. With a flick of her wrist, she summoned a massive vine which burst through the floor and arched overhead.

            “I thought we were going to wait?” Ivy whispered, sealing the exits with more plant life.

            “Yeah, well,” Harley drew her massive pop gun and leveled it at Bonnie and Hilda as they ran off. “Things change.”

            After locating two empty garbage bags, they lined up the socialites one after another and before long they had two half-full sacks of jewelry, money, expensive wallets, and designer scarves. As they were backing out of the one open exit, Harley caught sight of a woman with one of those wearable terrarium necklaces she’d seen all over the Internet recently. She snapped it off the woman’s neck, saluted her, and together she and Ivy barreled out of the building and into the night.

            Ivy was laughing gleefully, her laughter bright and shining in the dark. Harley doubted she’d ever get tired of the sound.

            “We did it!” Ivy spun to look at her as they ran toward the back of the building. “You did splendidly, Harl!”

            “Aw shucks,” Harley blushed as they rounded the corner of the building and found themselves amid tall overgrown grass and tightly packed, overgrown saplings. The perfect cover for an escape when the police would show up. All they’d have to do was exit stage left and they’d be home free. “I couldn’t’ve gotten far without ya plants, Red.”

            “I was a bit worried when you started things off without me.” They slowed to stop around the center of the tiny field. “But I had you pegged all wrong. Now we’re thousands of dollars richer, and soon my little ones will be planted and ready to cause mayhem.”

            Ivy knelt down in the dirt and retrieved a small, rusted spade from within a raised mound of soil. She dug a few small holes, placed her seeds inside, and covered them gently like a mother tucking children in bed against the dread of nightmares. She stood and dusted her hands, and smiled at Harley with such sincerity and gentleness that Harley regretted every moment she had ever messed up before, because now all she wanted was to make Ivy proud. There was one last thing that would make her smile last just a bit longer, though.

            “Red?” Harley said her name quietly. Taking a step toward her, she outstretched her closed hand. “This is for you.”

            Ivy placed her hand, soft yet tough from all her gardening, beneath Harley’s, and the little terrarium glittered in the moonlight and the red and blue reflections of the police lights approaching from the road above.

            “ _Moraea viscaria_ ,” Ivy clarified, “a modification of the iris. It’s beautiful, Harl. And you stole it just for little ol’ me.”

            Harley chuckled rubbing the back of her neck. “Ha, yeah, only the best for my best friend.”

            Ivy turned her back toward Harley and lifted her long red hair out of the way. Harley swallowed hard at the sight of her slender neck, her pale back, and took the cue to take the necklace and fasten it. Ivy turned toward her and modeled it.

            “What do you think?”

            Harley’s words stuck in her throat. “Beautiful.”

            Ivy frowned at the strengthening sound of sirens. “Sounds like the boys in blue have all arrived. Come on, the Rosebud is waiting for us. Do you wanna drive?”          

            Harley’s eyes widened. “Me?”

            “I’m wiped, but if you don’t want to—”

            “I’ll drive! I’ll drive us anywhere! Anywhere and everywhere! To hell and back!”

            Ivy snorted and tossed Harley the keys. “Just home is fine.”

* * *

 

            They burst through the door of Ivy’s townhouse, threw the loot to the floor and high-fived. Harley even began dancing, bumping her hip against Ivy’s. Ivy took the banana split they’d bought on the way home from her hands.

            “Careful!” She warned. “Don’t make a mess on these floors. I _do_ have a landlord, you know.”

            “Sorry,” Harley settled and took the ice cream back. “Any messes I make will come right outta my share from tonight, no worries.”

            Ivy’s eyes went to the ceiling. Taking off her boots and gloves, Ivy pushed the coffee table out of the way and spread out all of their earnings from the night. She spent the next few hours divvying up the loot while Harley ate her ice cream, made them cocoa, told her stories, and even braided Ivy’s hair.

            “The grand total, without the gold and other trinkets into account, comes to a whopping 10k, Harl.”

            “Whoo!” Harley sprung to her feet. “That’s five big ones for both of us! What about the other stuff?”

            “Unfortunately I don’t know much about gold, and I figured we’d keep the scarves and a few jewelry trinkets, since those will be hard to sell.”

            “Will ya sell the necklace I gave you?” Harley asked quietly.

            Ivy’s hand went to her throat, her heart pounding for just a second. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

            Harley kissed her cheek once more, her lips a bit sticky from the ice cream. “I think this is the start of a valuable friendship, Red.”

            “You won’t think that when I tell you we’re going to give most of the gold away.”

            “Nah, I ain’t complainin’. Puddin’ never let me have so much money from one heist before. Why give it away though?”

            “To Penguin, and perhaps Falcone and Maroni. To keep us in their good graces. We don’t have the resources to sell the stuff, but they will. Besides, it’s nice when the boys owe _us girls_ favors.”

            “Gee, Red, I like the way ya think,” Harley smiled.

            “I’m going to bed. It’s late, you can spend the night if you’d like.”

            “Ya don’t gotta tell me twice!” Harley chased after her to the stairs. “Not like I’ve got anywhere else to go, yeah?”

            Ivy cleared her throat, face a bit red. “Well, you’ve got here now, don’t you?”

            Harley stared at her wide-eyed before closing them, chuckling. “Yeah, guess I do.”

            Once upstairs, they stripped out of their costumes and into the pajamas they’d worn the night before. Harley wasn’t as tired as she’d been the first night, and this time she watched as Pam lay with her eyes closed, her breathing slowing so quickly. It reminded her of Bud and Lou, how quickly she could fall asleep.

            _She’s Ivy_ , Harley decided, _and I like her. She’s safe._

            She thought back to earlier in the day, when she had hugged her before they left for the auction, and she hugged herself a little.

            _She’s warm, too_. Harley thought. Funny, considering she had heard about Ivy being a “coldhearted bitch” when she worked at Arkham. Those days had been a blur for her, but she could still recall some things, before Joker. She may have even treated Ivy, for a short while, but she couldn’t recall.

            Sighing contentedly, Harley closed her eyes; hoping sleep would take her before the memories could.

* * *

 

            In the early hours of morning, Harley woke Ivy again. This time, however, it wasn’t from clinging, or gentle breath on her neck. The young woman was murmuring loudly in her sleep. Ivy’s eyes opened gently to see Harley’s arms clutched tight around herself.

            “Mistah J,” Harley groaned, and Ivy frowned as Harley curled up even tighter. “Red?”

            “I’m here,” Ivy whispered gently.

            Harley’s hand reached out like a small child searching for its mother. She grabbed hold so tightly the nails bit into Ivy’s skin. Ivy, for all of her confidence, felt lost.

            _She’s so fragile_ , her thoughts murmured. Slowly, she reached over and tucked a strand of hair behind Harley’s ear. The younger woman pressed her cheek into Ivy’s palm, as though craving the gentle touch. As Ivy lay there, her hand cupping Harley’s cheek, she wondered if Joker ever laid awake at night, watching as Harley lay lonely and lost, curled up on the other side of their shared bed. A surge of jealousy swept through Ivy and if she had been standing it would have knocked her to the ground. What did Harley see in that creep? Especially when he hurt her, used her, again and again.

            While lost in thought, Ivy’s fingers had drifted, traveled down her trembling shoulder and then down to her wrist.

            “Red,” Harley murmured again, and to Ivy’s surprise a smile spread across Harley’s lips. She slid into Ivy’s arms as though it were the only natural thing in this world, and burrowed her head into her ample chest.

            Ivy froze, her shock sending her body into working double-time to reeling back her toxins. The immunizations would have to be administered tomorrow, no exceptions. It had seemed pointless, making them back then, holding onto the foolish hope that maybe someone, someday…

            For the moment, she closed her eyes, and held Harley tighter to herself. She would deny it if anyone asked at some later point, but it was…possible that there were tears in her eyes. It was just nice to be held in someone’s arms once again.

* * *

 

            Harley awoke to an empty bed, which wasn’t unusual. Normally, on days when they had no crime planned, Joker went out and did God knew what with the boys or spent the day holed up in his office, concocting new plans, leaving Harley to her own devices. Joker had every episode of _The Three Stooges_ and _The Flintstones_ recorded on old Betamax tapes, so she was never quite left with nothing to do, but with Ivy there wasn’t anything quite like that. Besides, she would be able to spend the day with Ivy once again, so she wouldn’t have the chance to feel lonely.

            She rolled over and stretched, catching sight of the clock. She hadn’t even slept past noon. Ivy really was an early-riser.

            Borrowing one of Ivy’s robes, Harley made her way downstairs, where Ivy cooking something at the stove. Harley watched her for a moment, mesmerized as always by the sight of…her everything. It had to be envy. Part of her really wished she could look like that, instead of having the compact body of a gymnast.

            Ivy’s head lifted up, and she turned to Harley, as if she had sensed her staring. Her eyes went up and down Harley twice before she spoke.

            “Pancakes,” she said. “No bacon. Sorry, I’m a vegetarian.”

            “That’s okay,” Harley sat at the table eagerly. “It smells amazing!”

            “Good,” Ivy sighed, bringing a stack over to Harley. “I don’t usually do much cooking. Or eating, for that matter. I was worried I’d mess them up.”

            “Please,” Harley waved a hand dismissively. “And ya really should eat more. With me around, you’ll be well-fed, missy. I’m a _great_ cook!”

            Ivy turned off the range top and sat with her own plate, opposite Harley. “I’ll hold you to that.”

            Harley practically inhaled the stack of buckwheat pancakes, and even went so far as to lick her fingers once she was finished. The heist last night had taken a lot of energy, and she hadn’t really gotten to eat much before Bonnie and Hilda had gone running their mouths about Ivy…

            “Hey, Red?”

            “Mm?” Ivy made a sound while sipping some milk.

            “You don’t gotta worry, I’m always gonna be around to protect ya from creeps, okay?”

            Ivy blinked at her with a surprised expression. “Um…thank you, Harl. But, speaking of protecting. There’s something we have to do.”

            Ivy stood up, went into the garage greenhouse, and returned with a small rack of syringes. Harley’s pulse started racing and her feet itched to run.

            “A-Are those all for me?”

            “Technically. Only one today. I’m toxic to the touch, and while it’s weaker on women prolonged exposure to me could kill you if you aren’t immunized. I’m giving you the option.”

            “I hate shots,” Harley grimaced, and yanked up her sleep, “but if it means I can stick around ya, I’ll take as many as ya got!”

            Ivy blinked, she hadn’t thought she’d get this far. “You’re serious?”

            “As a heart attack,” Harley nodded. “Just be sure ya don’t pierce a vein, okay?”

            Ivy rolled her eyes, opening the sterilization pad from its packaging “I’m not going to pierce a vein.”

            “Is it a shot in the arm or the butt?”

            “What? Arm, silly. Stop fooling around. Arm, please.”

            “Sing me a song.”

            “I’m not gonna sing you a song. Look away if you’re scared.”

            Harley turned her head, but Ivy could see her eyes were still screwed shut. She sighed, pausing with the tip of the needle above her skin.

            “What do you call it when a bull eats a bomb?” Ivy asked.

            Harley sniffled. “W-What?”

            “Abominable.”

            When Harley started laughing, Ivy inserted the needle and pushed the plunger. It didn’t quite work though, because she still pulled back her arm and yelped.

            “Owowowowowowowwwww!!!” Harley whined, frantically stomping her feet on the floor.

            “I thought it wouldn’t hurt!” Ivy got to her feet, hovering at her side uncertainly.

            “Well it fucking does! Christ, it burns! My veins are on fire!”

            “It’s the immunization; it must be messing with the nerves near the injection site. It’ll get worse as it spreads, hold on,” Ivy sat, and her cool hands took Harley’s aching arm in a gentle, but firm grasp. “Here.”

            Ivy placed her lips gently on the injection area, and her kiss instantly numbed the skin beneath it.

            “The toxins I secrete can have a numbing effect, to someone immune. Better?”

            “A-A little,” Harley sniffled, “but it’s spreading.”

            Ivy sighed, and continued kissing up Harley’s arm. Harley shuddered, and not entirely from the pain, or the gentle numbing of Ivy’s kiss. Ivy’s touch, her lips, the kisses were all so soft and gentle that Harley couldn’t help but melt inside. Her skin turned to goosebumps and she felt every fine hair on her body stand up as though lightning were about to strike from the sky.

            Once she had kissed up to her elbow, Ivy sat up and their faces were so close Harley could count every long lash that framed her green eyes, which were heavily half-lidded as though she were caught in a dream. Harley understood, because her eyes were doing the same.

            _She’s going to kiss you_ , a voice in her mind warned her, but try as she might she couldn’t find another voice to tell her to pull back, or run.

            “Your pheromones aren’t the ones making me wanna kiss ya,” Harley asked breathily as Ivy moved to close the gap between them, “are they?”

            “Not a chance.”

            “Good.”

            Harley moved that last inch and suddenly their lips were firmly braced against each other, as though shouldering some great weight that neither could hold on their own. Ivy held Harley so tightly to her, yet gently; she could feel the cold glass orb of the terrarium necklace against her own evidently flushed skin. Ivy’s tongue gently brushed Harley’s lips, asking for permission for entrance. Harley began slowly reciprocating, opening her mouth just a bit more, until their tongues made contact.

            Ivy pulled back suddenly, leaving Harley’s arms in the air where they had been braced on Ivy’s back not thirty seconds before. She pulled out a Band-Aid from the side of the syringe rack, and bandaged Harley’s tender skin.

            “Be sure to massage the bandage every hour or so, to keep your skin from bruising,” Ivy advised in a voice cold and level, as though they hadn’t just passionately kissed.

            “Right,” Harley muttered.

            Ivy nodded, packed up the syringe, and went into the garage, closing the door behind her. Harley waited for Ivy to return, and a minute rolled by, and then another, and another, until ten minutes went by and Ivy hadn’t emerged. This was all her fault, she shouldn’t have kissed her, should have apologized for kissing her. Friends don’t kiss friends.

            She ran to the garage door, but found it locked. She slumped back against it, and slid to the floor. Well, it looked like she would be lonely today after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am the queen of page breaks


	3. Sorry For the Trouble

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A certain black cat crosses Harley's path

            Ivy’s back fell heavy against the solid wood of the greenhouse lab door. It was much easier to think from the floor, in her opinion. After all, from there the only way to go was up. She curled her knees to her chin, with her hands clenched tight in the long tendrils of red hair, and barely bit back a scream.

            _You idiot!_ Pamela stamped the floor with the butt of her heel. _If the serum hadn’t worked you could have killed her!_

            But it had worked.

            It had worked, and she was alive and breathing and crying and soft and she had _kissed her back_. When Poison Ivy kissed someone there wasn’t anything left in them to return the gesture. It was easy, in that way, to imagine she was not Poison Ivy, that Poison Ivy had never been, and Pamela Isley had been allowed to step forward in her own skin once again. An old Pamela, the one prior to all the hurt and betrayal. Everyone left Pamela, in the end. But Harley was different, in plentiful and perplexing ways she was different. In the past, when others left Ivy, they were gone for good, and in the scar tissue of her heart she thanked each of them for it. If they were so quick to leave they didn’t need her to begin with, nor she them.

            But Harley was different. She was the first person to come back to her without a trick of the sciences, without a touch of her pheromones, and she had kissed her. And she had kissed her back.

            A thud fell against the door, and the familiar sound of a back sliding down the wood joined soon after. She could hear Harley sniffling through the divide between them.

            “I’m sorry, Red. I…I didn’t mean to kiss ya, it was…it was just I was hurting is all. I didn’t mean nothin’ by it, honest. Do you forgive me?”

            _She was in pain_ , Ivy reasoned with herself. Crying and screaming and hurting. Ivy had wanted her to shut up, but also wanted to take the pain away. Not just with the numbing toxins, but through her own power. Harley was hurting, and she had wanted the good inside of her—whatever fraction of that which remained—to reach her. It was just what a friend would do.

            “Sorry for all the trouble I caused.”

            At the bottom of it all, the main reason Ivy had run away like the coward she was simply that she was afraid, and always would be afraid, of the aftermath of how others would react when she communicated an emotion. Not the sort of fear like one might have with the dark or with high place; it was just that time and time again she was taught that her feelings didn’t much matter. So she had simultaneously stopped asking for permission at the same time as vowing to never watch the fallout of something that wouldn’t directly benefit her.

            That was why it took her five minutes to open the door.

            She had expectations of finding Harley huddled or sprawled out somewhere, bawling and choking on her tears. She even allowed her mind to race fleetingly with the anticipation of being able to finally and fully hold another living being once again, especially one that meant her no harm.

            But the tiny house was empty, her jester costume gone.

            Harley Quinn had left her once again.

* * *

 

            Gotham bore such a distinct smell; in the lush and green scent of Ivy’s tiny townhouse she had forgotten the city’s stink of rot and decay—and the occasional salty waft of air brushed upward from random hot dog stands. Now, Harley stood poised on the edge of a rooftop, fully suited, contemplating the gap between one building to the other.

            “The trick is not to think about it.”

            The voice from behind her was husky and sultry. She spun, expecting Ivy, but instead found a woman in a leather bodysuit leaning against the short wall of the rooftop exit. The cat ears atop her head, Harley spied, were decidedly cute, but she couldn’t find much joy in them. She had been expecting green eyes of another kind to greet hers in the dark. Foolish, of course. Why would Ivy come chasing after her?

            “Jumping, I mean. If you weren’t in costume, I’d think you were suicidal, but looks like Gotham has a tendency of gathering our kind together in the night. If you’re looking to hit up the bank on the east end, don’t bother.” The masked woman warned mildly. “I already cleaned them out.”

            With a kick of her boot, a large sack fell out of the shadow and into the light of the streetlamps.

            “I don’t hear no sirens,” Harley pointed out.

            “Duh.” The woman cocked a brow. “I’m good at my job.”

            “Harley Quinn.”

            “I didn’t ask for your name.”

            “Yeah, but you’re sticking around, so you must want something.”

            “Caught me,” the cat-suited woman placed her hands on her hips. “What are you doing crying on a roof at this time of night? Look at you; you’re all dirtied up, and no mask?”

            “…It fell off,” because her tears had loosened up the spirit gum she’d used to keep it in place. It may also have been the sweat, too. She’d spent the whole afternoon jogging around Robinson Park before night fell and she could feel safe to put on her suit. Exercising was usually a good way to keep her mind clear, but today it was a battle— _exercise, Red, Joker, Ivy, kissing, boyfriend, best friend, more than friends?_ Harley wiped her nose. “Ain’t none of ya business, lady.”

            “All right, I know when I’m not wanted. I came over this way to make sure you weren’t some kid; I thought your jester hat piece was a set of pigtails.”

            “I am wearing pigtails,” Harley sniffled, “just under my cap is all.”

            “Jesus, you are just a kid,” the woman sighed, her expression full of pity and concern.

            “I’m twenty-six!”

            “Ten years younger than me. Call me Catwoman.”

            “I didn’t ask for ya name.”

            “Think I give a shit?”

            Harley thought on it. She and Catwoman would likely never cross paths again, so long as they weren’t looking to hold up the same place at the same time. Venting to her would almost certainly yield no lasting consequences; she turned toward the woman in the cat-eared leather fetish suit, tears in her eyes, as if she were a holy confessional.

            “My puddin’—”

            “Who?”

            “ _Joker_.”

            Catwoman snorted. “You call that _clown_ Puddin’?”

            Harley flushed. “He has a certain sweet charm, aright?”

            “If you insist,” Catwoman muttered.

            “He…can be rough sometimes.”

            “Rough?” Catwoman leaned against the rooftop’s edge; the lights of cars rushing past and neon signs etched her outline in fluxing flashes of color. “How rough?”

            “He loses himself, around me. He can’t control what’s a fist and what’s a hug sometimes.”

            “That’s called domestic violence, kitten.”

            “Listen, do ya want me to tell ya about this or not?” Harley glowered until Catwoman held up her hands and seated herself on the rooftop ledge fearlessly. Cats had nine lives, but she was rather certain she couldn’t fly. “What does it mean when another girl kisses ya?”

            “Please don’t kiss me.”

            “Not you,” Harley snapped, but softened both sadly and fondly, her body growing warm in perplexing ways at the remembrance of her and Ivy’s first kiss. “I kissed someone. A friend of mine. She’s been there for me more than once, and even though we haven’t really spent too much time with each other, we’ve known each other a long time. I got hurt, and her face was right in front of mine, and I looked in her eyes, and…”

            Catwoman waited a second. “And?”

            “And,” Harley hugged herself, staring out at Gotham in its dark and shining beauty, “it was the first time someone looked at me like they wanted to help me. To fix me. Change me, heal me, I don’t even know. Like she had never even thought of hurting me, and maybe never even _would_ think about hurting me.”

            “So you kissed her.”

            Harley smiled, smooshing her face into her hands. “And she kissed me back.”

            “Bi.”

            “Oh, I’m sorry, you can go I just—”

            “Not bye, _bi_. You’re bi.”

            “What?”

            “Bisexual.”

            A thousand question marks strewn across Harley’s mind in neon. “Wha?”

            “You’re into your own gender, but also other genders too, hence your deadbeat boyfriend.”

            “No…” Harley shook her head. “Maybe. I dunno. It doesn’t feel like all girls, I think. I dunno. I don’t remember ever looking at one and wanting to k-kiss them, h-hold them, before Red.”

            “Your friend’s name is Red?”

            “Nah, it’s Pa—Poison Ivy.”

            Catwoman tossed her head back and laughed. She had to stand up to keep herself from falling over the edge of the building and plummeting to the ground below. Harley watched with annoyance as the woman went so far as to bend double as she belted out peal after peal of laughter.

            “Ya done, pussycat?”

            “I’m sorry,” Catwoman wiped a tear from her eye. “It’s just that when you mentioned your friend I thought you meant someone who wasn’t a heartless bitch.”

            “Red ain’t heartless!” Harley shouted, hands clenched into fists. “She’s quiet and tough, but she ain’t heartless! She took me in and gave me a home and healed me up and gave me a shot so I won’t die around her!”

            “A shot? To…wait, you mean she gave you immunity to her _poison?_ Are you delusional?”

            “Well, I mean I’m a patient at Arkham so—”

            “Sorry, that was insensitive. Are you _sure_ we’re talking about the same Poison Ivy? Why would she give _you_ , out of _everyone_ who has tried to get close to her, immunity?”

            Harley covered her hand with her mouth. Oh, she messed up. She messed this up real bad. At the bottom of it, even if Ivy hadn’t wanted her to kiss her, Ivy was still her friend. And she’d left. Again. Ivy was probably as hurt and confused as she was, and she’d just run from the problem, literally.

            “I gotta go, kitty!”

            Harley ran toward the edge of the rooftop, and didn’t bother to look back as she went, clearing the space between buildings in one clean leap.

* * *

 

            Harley burst through the front door of the townhouse, panting and half in tears. She blinked into the darkness. Not a single light was on. Chest heaving, she shut the door behind her, her pulse thrumming out of control.

            “Red?”

            She trailed her fingers over a potted fern as she felt for a light switch. She couldn’t recall where it was, and with an inward sigh she drew her shaking hand to her side, resigning herself to allow her eyes to adjust to the dark. Her brain wasn’t working; all she could think about was the strange look in Ivy’s eyes after their kiss. The blank canvas of those green eyes was unreadable, their every emotion unattainable, so purposefully blocked.

            The bedroom was empty, the sheets still rumpled and clumsily folded in the way she’d left them that morning. The adjoining bathroom was equally silent. Back down the stairs, through the kitchen, she hesitated, staring at the garage greenhouse door.

            In her mind’s eye, she envisioned the worst: Ivy hadn’t left her greenhouse all day, unaware that Harley had even left, and she sat alone and holed up in her little green laboratory, thinking Harley didn’t care about the kiss, or what she’d done.

            The door opened easily, and at the end of the room, where the garage door was supposed to be, Ivy sat at her desk. The dim blue light of the computer framed her back, and Harley could tell she was deep in work.

            “You’re gonna hurt ya eyes,” Harley cleared her throat. “Red—”

            “Back again, I see?”

            Harley winced at the cold tone in Ivy’s voice. It wasn’t neutral, it was purposefully icy.

            “I looked for you, you know.” Ivy went on, her fingers clicking away on the keyboard. “I knew you would leave, eventually. Seems to be a pattern of yours, don’t you think? Don’t answer that; it’s rhetorical. Of course I know the answer.”

            “Red—”

            “You left your share of the heist behind. Don’t worry, I haven’t touched it. You’ll find it on the coffee table on your way out.”

            “Red!”

            “And the clothes you borrowed from me, you can keep them. I won’t—”

            “Red, just—” Harley stamped forward and yanked the string of the overhead light “—look at me!”

            Ivy whipped toward her, shock in her eyes at the sudden exposure of light. Those green eyes, the ones that had been haunting her since she left, fell upon her, bloodshot and swollen, but no expression lay in them or on her freckled face.

            “Don’t worry about the other shots,” Ivy went on, as if Harley wasn’t near tears, panting and drenched in sweat. “You won’t need them.”

            “Why?”

            “You’re clearly finished with me,” Ivy stood and folded her arms. “And I don’t need you walking around with immunity to my strongest defense. It was a mistake, I see that clearly now. Forget about everything that happened this morning. None of it matters.”

            Harley drew in a wavering breath, feeling as though ice-cold ocean waves were rocking against her body, knocking her off balance and numbing her limbs. She nodded slowly, her brows scrunched tight together.

            “So where’m I supposed to go?” She asked in a small voice.

            “I’m sure your Puddin’ would want you back by now.”

            “Right,” Harley laughed bitterly, shaking her head. “I ran into Catwoman tonight.”

            She waited for Ivy to respond, but she said nothing. She waited, and waited, but the woman just stared at her with those impassive eyes, as though she were building the wall between them higher and higher as they spoke.

            “She was right,” Harley muttered. “You’re a heartless bitch! _I hate you!_ ”

            “I knew you would,” Ivy muttered, and a tired smile spread her lips. It felt like a slap to Harley’s face…but also like a blow to her heart. “Get out of here, Harley Quinn. May our paths never cross again.”

            Harley’s share of the loot was on the coffee table just as she’d said. She waited a moment, hand clenched around the duffle bag handle, hoping against hope that that garage door would swing open. One minute rolled by, then another, and then five, and Harley knew that what they had, whatever that was, was over. And she had ruined it with her own hands.

            _Goddamn it, Harleen_ , Harley cursed herself as she slammed the front door of the townhouse shut behind her. _Goddamn it._


	4. What A Mess

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, someone spilled a sex scene in my fic

            The henchmen were ecstatic to see Harley, as they often were when she had been gone a long while. Johnny, as always, greeted her warmly, clapping her back with heavy pats of his hand. Harley’s own hands had been shaking for hours, but she didn’t dare voice it, not even in her thoughts.

            “Weird to see _you_ walking around in civvies! Good ol’ Quinn, always back just when we need ya.” Johnny Frost smiled in that way that was endearing once upon a time, but, like everything which spent too much time with Joker, it too had gone dry—sullen, gray, lifeless, like the nicotine-laced air of the hideout. “Boss has been on the warpath ever since ya left. Should’ve seen him; it was like that time someone stole his wallet.”

            “Yeah, yeah, paws off the merchandise, Johnny boy.” Harley brushed off his heavy hand and moved past him, shifting the weight of the bag on her shoulder. When Johnny moved in to catch up with her, her eyes went to the ceiling. “Whaddaya want, bub?”

            “First no costume, now you’re heading off to your room? I’ve _never_ seen you come back home and not jump into the boss’s lap before.”

            Harley turned up her nose and grasped the strap of her bag again, shifting its weight so that it swung and hit Johnny square in the gut. The weight of five-thousand dollars and the extra pounds added on by the fine jewelry took the air out of him, and Harley was able to slip into her room.

            He was right though. No suit, no beeline to Joker’s presence, she hadn’t even come directly home from Ivy’s. The woman had thrown her for such a loop that Harley couldn’t find the strength to head anywhere in particular. For hours, she had wandered the city, until the lights of businesses started to go out, until the GCPD strengthened its presence on patrol as it did when the hour turned late. If they pulled her aside and found the money, she’d be on the fast track back to Arkham. Honestly, perhaps that would have been better.

            Even with the light on, it was dark. The walls were dreary, cracked and gray and stained from the years of their living there, and previous occupants before. The abandoned funhouse was once the turf of a few homeless groups, and while Joker had cleared them out long before Harley joined his ranks some rooms still stank of piss. Other rooms also stank of piss from the drunken thugs and hyenas. On the wall, beside the makeshift vanity she’d made out of crates and cardboard boxes, was a long dark stain from the time she’d thrown her drink at Joker, glass and all. That was right before the last time she went to stay with Ivy; she wondered if the stain would be there forever.

            As she set her bag on the bed, she sat on the floor atop a pile of dirty clothes, her face in her hands as a single thought rang clear in her head:

            _What a mess_.

            Had this place always been so filthy, such a pig-sty? She couldn’t help but think of the oasis that was Ivy’s townhouse, the fresh scent of flowers and ferns, waking up and feeling like she’d awoke in a garden, the shining floors with nary a smudge in sight. The clean sheets, a bed with a frame and a box spring, and a soft and sweetly-scented body to warm the sheets at night…

            Harley wrapped the money in a few sweaters. As she was stuffing them into a different duffle bag, in case Johnny or Ralph went snooping through her stuff looking for exactly what she was hiding, something glittered and caught her eye.

            In her shaking hand, the tiny glass terrarium rolled from her fingertips and into the dip of her palm. She clenched it, careful not to crush it, and tucked it into her pocket, cursing as she futilely locked the door behind her.

            Joker’s “war room,” he called it, was the darkest of the building. The room was large as an auditorium, and empty but for a single table covered in maps and blueprints, lit by a single bulb on a string. Joker stood at the broad end of it, facing the door, but didn’t look up as she entered.

            “I told you, Rocco, no broccoli! It gets caught in my teeth, now get to cooking chop, chop!” He made a shooing gesture at the door.

            “I-It’s me, Puddin’…”

            Joker held up a finger, jotting something down in that loopy scrawl of his, before looking up. He stared at her a moment, as if not seeing her and seeing her at once, before his face drew up into that old charismatic grin.

            “Oh _Harl_ , back from the Little Shop of Horrors so soon? Why, I thought Pammy would have kept you for much longer; you were hardly gone at all.”

            Harley furrowed her brow. “I was still gone a coupla days, didn’tcha miss me Mistah J?”

            “Days? It felt like hours to me…” At Harley’s frown, he backpedaled. “Did I say hours? I meant months, snookums.”

            Harley didn’t move as he draped an arm on her shoulder, allowing him to kiss her. At the last moment, she turned her head, feigning thinking he was going for a cheek kiss regardless. If he noticed her deflection, he didn’t show it. It felt wrong kissing him, somehow. Probably because her lips had been on someone else’s not many hours ago. Were his lips always so rough? His nose, had it always been so eager to poke at her, to get in the way?

            “Got anything big planned tonight, Puddin’?” She let him lead her over to the table, his arm around her like a leash. “Murder and mayhem, or just some good ol’ shtick?”

            “Why, Harl, you and your new friend Pammy gave me a _wonderful_ idea!” Joker beamed at her with yellow teeth; the way he said “Pammy” made her stomach roil with unease. “That area you pulled that little stunt with the plant last night? Brilliant! Just the perfect place!”

            “Perfect place for what?” Then something he said made Harley’s heart leapt a thousand feet. Never, _never_ before had she been praised for a job, or any aspect of a job, she had pulled on her own. “Y-Ya mean it?”

            “Why, you must have walked away with close to a couple _thousand_ , right?”

            A lump like a curled up porcupine formed in Harley’s throat. “Y-You heard about…”

            “Don’t worry, Johnny boy has already helped himself to your room, he’ll be more than happy to count what you got—I know _numbers_ aren’t your thing, Harley girl.” His phone, a dated old flip phone, buzzed on the table. “Why, that must be him now! Let’s see what the grand total was, shall we?”

            He pinched her cheek, and she watched as his smile faded and his eyes went wide.

            “Five thousand, _and_ nearly as much in trinkets, eh?” His smile returned, but was a more sinister gleam. “Rolled up in clothes and put into a new bag. Why, Harl, I had no idea you were so clever.”

            Harley’s pulse began thrumming through her body, coursing blood everywhere but her face. “I only…hid it from Ralph, Puddin’! I think he was the one that stole ya wallet once, I wanted every last penny to go to you.”

            “Hm,” his smile didn’t waver as he slid in behind her, placing his hands on her waist. “If that were true, Harl, then why didn’t you just bring the money to me right away, huh? Thought you could pull one over on your old man Mr. J?”

            “N-no s-sir,” her jaw was shaking, and not out of desire.

            His hands slid down and down, until they rested on her hips, then her pockets.

            “Not holding out? Then what’s this—?”

            His fingers clenched around the terrarium and instinct kicked in. Harley’s hand balled into a fist and her arm swung backward, colliding with Joker’s face. He made an unbecoming grunt as he fell backward to the floor. Harley spun, facing him and panting with her fist still clenched. He sat up, and rubbed his jaw, laughing as blood spilled from his mouth and onto his white pressed shirt.

            “I _was_ going to let you play tonight, Harley. Now, me and the boys will have to gas South Gotham, _including_ the little auction hall you and _Pammy_ hit last night, _without you_.” The door opened, spilling light across Harley and Joker, and the silhouettes of two henchmen blocked the light. “Take her away, boys! And throw away the key.”

            When they threw her onto her bed, Harley saw that Johnny hadn’t just taken her money, he’d taken her clothes, her costume, everything. All Harley had were her cell phone, the clothes on her back, the terrarium in her pocket, and a grudge burning in her heart. Then, suddenly, fear as the door locked. Not for her; she’d been locked in before. For Ivy. For her plants.

            Wrapping her elbow in the pillowcase, Harley smashed the only window in the room, lifted herself up, and dragged herself out into the dark.

* * *

 

            Honestly, the sight of Harley Quinn sobbing, tears streaming down her face, holding herself on her front doorstep was hardly a new sight. Poison Ivy stood solid and stalwart in the doorway, blocking the light from inside.

            “Only a few hours this time,” Ivy folded her arms. “I suppose I should be flattered.”

            Harley sniffled, gulping in air. “R-Red, I need ya—”

            “If you’re looking for a warm place to sleep tonight,” said Ivy, “this isn’t it. Take your share and put yourself up in a hotel room until your ‘puddin’ wants you back in his pathetic life.”

            “He took it all,” she whispered, tears slipping down her lips. “My money, my clothes, even my costume, Red. He’s gonna do something real, real bad, and I need ya help.”

            Ivy arched a brow. “You? Go against Joker? As if. Find yourself some other patsy, Harl, I’m not falling for—”

            “WAIT!” Harley cried, halting Ivy from closing the door. She reached into her pocket and retrieved something. “He’s gonna blast South Gotham with Joker Gas! That stuff’ll give everyone shit-for-brains and kill every plant it touches. Your plants, Red, _our_ plants, the ones we got special planted together.”

            Ivy didn’t move to accept whatever Harley held concealed in her hand. “Let him. I told you, what happened between us is over and done. I don’t deal with retrospection Harley. Goodbye.”

            Ivy closed the door just as Harley crouched down, setting something on the concrete step. Once shut, Harley shouted through the wood.

            “I’m gonna hitch a cab there!” She called, her voice broken and stressed and raw in all the wrong places from her tears. “I’m leaving this here, in case…in case I don’t come back! And Red…for what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

            Ivy didn’t move an inch as her plants warned her that Harley was one, two, three blocks away before she got a cab.

            _For what it’s worth, I’m sorry_.

            Sorry for what? Calling her heartless? No, worse, a cold-hearted bitch? Honestly, she couldn’t blame her. Her cold heart, carefully chilled to keep all else out, kept her from looking at the doorstep until Harley was far away.

            The terrarium, the glass obscured by just the tiniest smudge of lipstick from a kiss.

            Cursing, Ivy fastened the necklace behind her neck, and hopped into the car parked on the curb.

            It would have been impossible to clock exactly how many stop signs, red lights, and speed limits Ivy had abused as she sped her way downtown. Had it not been for the late hour, the backroads that led into South Gotham, she would have been pulled over for sure.

            The gas was already billowing in noxious hues over the hillsides and buildings when Ivy pulled up to the auction hall. She wished she had chosen a car with more function than flare, because she could have just driven right down the hill to the field behind the building. She thought she spied a glimpse of blonde hair amidst the overgrown saplings, but couldn’t be sure. She nearly lost her footing as she charged down the hill, but her recklessness was blasted from her mind at the sight of Harley pawing at the dirt, her eyes swollen in more ways than one, from tears, the gas, and the fresh black eye on her face.

            “I tried to stop him,” Harley laughed through tears so effortlessly it brought a spark of pain to Ivy’s chest thinking about how much practice she’d had to get so experienced. “I asked him to stop, please, do East Gotham instead, but he wouldn’t listen. He never listens. So I came here…to…to try to save…you worked so hard to grow…don’t wanna let you down…”

            Harley fell forward, and Ivy caught her. She blinked up at Ivy, looking so miserable and beaten, more so than the moment they first met. Harley stretched out an arm toward the soil again, even as Ivy hefted her from the ground, cradling her to her chest bridal style. She was frighteningly light in her arms. It brought images of feeding her, tending to her, filling her with warmth that she could never receive from Joker’s cold hands; she wanted to fatten her up on a full and loving garden.

            “W-Why’m I so…?”

            “The immunizations,” Ivy explained as she carried her up the hill, the gas billowing all around them and illuminated as the sky was with moonlight and the lights from the city. Overhead, three sharp shadows rose up above the distant skyline, soaring like large birds in pursuit of prey. The Bats never took long to respond to trouble. “We haven’t completed them yet. You’re immune to toxins, poisons, you won’t die, but without the full treatment you’re still vulnerable to them. Some clean air, another shot at home—”

            “Ya mean you’re still gonna give me the sh—”

            “Shh,” Ivy placed her lengthwise into the long, single seat of the old-fashioned car. Gingerly, she lifted her head onto her lap at the drivers’ side, and together they rode in silence back home. She glanced down at Harley as they sped down the highway, the stars a spangled blanket overhead as the wind whipped at her hair. Harley could almost support her own weight by the time Ivy helped her cross the threshold.

            The usually bubbly blond sat limp at the kitchen table after scrubbing her hands a raw pink, staring blankly at the floor as Ivy heated up some mild broth, made her a glass of lemonade. Dutifully, Harley sipped, and didn’t fuss when the second immunization was injected into her arm. She winced slightly, but kept sipping at her soup.

            “I really did mean it,” Harley confided, so quietly, as though speaking to the broth in her bowl. “I’m sorry, I really did mean it. I meant to kiss you. I wanted to kiss you. I knew it was wrong, I know it was wrong. To wanna kiss your friend. Disgusting.”

            Ivy reached over, and very gently slid some hair behind Harley’s ear.

            “It isn’t disgusting,” Ivy murmured, leaning forward to rest her forehead against the back of Harley’s head. “And even if it was, then I must be disgusting, too.”

            Harley looked up at her with those big blue eyes, still partially swollen from all the tears, the gas, the black eye, but Ivy thought she looked every bit as beautiful as she had the first morning she’d rolled over and saw her asleep in her bed, lying in the pre-morning dawn.

            “Because right before we did,” Ivy breathed, shoving all her screaming thoughts aside, as before allowing Pamela to step forward in her own skin once again, to finally get a taste of what she wanted, “I’d never wanted someone to kiss me more in my entire life. The whole time I was thinking _kiss me, kiss me, oh god, please, let her want to kiss me_.”

            Harley’s eyes scrunched up, new tears flooding her already sodden face, and she reached out, wrapping her arms around Ivy’s neck.

            “Pamela,” she blubbered, “can I kiss you? Can I want to kiss you? Please please please please…”

            Ivy cupped Harley’s face gently, brushing a thumb across her trembling lips. “Say my name. If you really want me to kiss you, say my name. Over and over, say it, and then I’ll kiss you. You and only you, and only if you want—really, truly want. No pheromones, no tricks, it has to be all you.”

            “Pamela,” Harley sobbed into the crook her neck, “ _Pamela, Pamela_ , I’m sorry, so sorry Pamela. I want you to kiss me, I want you, I want you to kiss me, please, Pamela.”

            Their lips met in a gentle, but firm press that made something inside of Ivy, at the pit of her stomach, leap with anticipation. Not twenty-four hours ago they had kissed at this same table, their embrace hungry, but in a different way. Before, it was the hunger of desiring contact, of desperately wanting to reach out to another, to grab hold and take shape and touch and be touched in return. Touch-starved, love-starved, they now clung to each other, and to Ivy’s surprise, Harley’s mouth opened first, her tongue asking for entry, and without hesitation Ivy’s lips parted, allowing Harley to slip inside.

            They stood, still embraced, kissing with such clumsy fervor that their teeth knocked together. Harley sat on the table, wrapping her legs around Ivy’s waist as she fisted her shirt in her hands, dragging her tighter inward so Ivy was kissing down into her. As Harley shifted her hips into Ivy’s, for a second time Ivy imagined feeding Harley, in several ways, she imagined Harley never having to go hungry, never having to want for anything—attention, contact, connection, sympathy, _lo_ …she couldn’t finish the word—for as long as they knew each other, for as long as Harley wanted her in her life. She would feed her until she was full, until she was stuffed, until she would grow sick on it, the affection, and still she wouldn’t stop. It was cruel, this feeling. Ivy wanted Harley to burst at even the thought of her.

            “Carry me upstairs,” Harley wrapped her arms around Pamela’s neck, panting against her ear. “Please, _Pamela, Pamela, Pamela_ …”

            They would always be unsure how they had made it up the flight of stairs to the bedroom, between their eager kissing, Harley taking breaks to bite Pamela’s neck, her shoulders, the subtle wobble in Harley’s step, it was a miracle they crossed the threshold at all. When Harley draped herself backward onto the bed, Ivy wished momentarily that Harley had taken the time to wash the Joker Gas from her slim body, but when her shaking hands went to the hem of Ivy’s shirt the thought was obliterated. Ivy broke the kiss and straightened up, her knee braced beside Harley’s hip as she lifted her own shirt over her head. When she looked down, Harley was blushing.

            “Hey,” she bent once again, her thumb brushing Harley’s lips, “we don’t have to do anything you don’t want. If you’re still weak from the gas, not sure of what’s going on—”

            Harley very gently kissed Ivy’s thumb. “I want you, Pamela, Red, my Red. I’m okay. I’m here. I’m _here_. I’m all _here_. Not just better from the gas, but it’s like—like my head isn’t so fuzzy. I can’t remember the last time I knew what I wanted so badly.”

            Ivy chuckled, her chest feeling light. “You want me, huh?”

            “So, very”—kiss—“very”—kiss—“very”—bite—“much. No tricks, no foolin’. Just me. All of me wants you. Do you want me?”

            “Yes,” the answer came without hesitation. “I was so cruel, Harl, I thought that you were—if I—talking to you like that, _saying_ those things, I was so…”

            “Scared,” Harley nodded, her fingertips brushing against Ivy’s cheek, sliding through the long red hair that cascaded around them. “I’d have done the same, if I were you. You’d have done the same if you were me. We’re different because we’re two separate people, and we hurt in different kinds of ways. No shame in that, Red. I can’t make ya trust me, and you can’t make me trust you, but we can help each other understand one another. I want…to understand you.”

            Harley leaned up, and drew the shirt she was wearing over her head. She arched a brow as she hesitated to undo her bra, as though asking if Ivy wanted to, but the moment of hesitation gave her enough time to unhook it, slide the straps down her slender arms, and toss it away.

            “God,” Ivy rested her forehead on Harley’s, “Harl, you’re so beautiful.”

            “Nuh-uh,” Harley kissed her nose. “I’m all scarred up and weird-lookin’.”

            “You are to me,” Ivy kissed her way from Harley’s lips, down her chin, to her neck, to her chest. She kissed each pert peak of her nipples, gently rolling one with her tongue as her fingers did the other. She smirked into Harley’s breast when the girl beneath her began to moan. “They’re so pink and sweet, like young strawberry tops.”

            “Y-You nerd,” Harley panted, her hand knotted in her golden hair, the other in Ivy’s. “If you’re gonna run ya mouth, use it for s-something else.”

            Ivy chuckled into Harley’s skin as she continued her trail of kisses and licks down her chest to her stomach. Her teeth grazed Harley’s hipbone before she sank her teeth in, lightly biting as Harley began to writhe, moaning Ivy’s name— _Pamela, Pamela_.

            Not bothering with the button on her shorts, Ivy pulled them down Harley’s toned legs. This close, she could see she didn’t shave them, and the faint golden hairs glittered faintly in the lamplight. It grounded her, seeing this; it removed some of the dreamy aspect of the moment. She kissed her way along Harley’s leg, taking special note of the bruises, until she was at her inner thigh. She paused at Harley’s panties, and snorted. She rested her forehead against Harley’s stomach.

            “What’s so funny?”

            “Nothing,” Ivy couldn’t stop herself from laughing. “Y-Your panties are just…they’re so _you_.”

            They weren’t sexy lingerie, but a cute pastel pair with a character from one of Harley’s favorite cartoons on them. It was perfect, and it was all her. She took special care removing them, having originally planned to bite them clean off, for the dramatic effect of it, but she knew Harley would be mad if she’d harmed these.

            “Wonderful,” Ivy breathed at the sight of Harley fully exposed to her. “Amazing.”

            “Not really…” Harley shifted uncomfortably, and Ivy rose up to kiss her again.

            “Beautiful, spectacular,” Ivy breathed against Harley’s lips, not breaking eye contact as her hand drifted low, her fingers just teasing Harley’s wet sex. “And all mine.”

            Harley swallowed. “All yours, R-Red. I’m ready.”

            “Oh, but I don’t think you are, not for the main thing,” Ivy teased. Instead of entering Harley, her fingers traced slow circles, instantly making Harley’s toes clench. Harley’s lips latched onto Ivy’s desperately, cutting off anymore teasing from Ivy’s mouth.

            “R-Red,” Harley panted, “c’mon—”

            Kissing her deeply, Ivy’s finger sank into Harley just as Harley’s tongue asked for entrance to Pamela’s mouth. Harley bucked her hips down and down, seeking out more, her hands knotted up in Ivy’s hair.

            Harley pulled away suddenly, and Ivy was surprised to feel her tighten around her finger.

            “Well,” Ivy gasped, “I know I’m _good_ but…”

            “Sorry,” Harley covered her face with her hands. “It’s just…I don’t…we had never really…I’m so…”

            “Shh,” Ivy peppered her cheek with quick kisses as she cooed, “it’s okay, baby, we have all night.”

            “L-Let me,” Harley kissed her once again, using it as an opportunity to flip Ivy onto her back.

            She allowed Harley to remove her bra, and smirked as the blonde jester’s face grew awash with both desire and envy. She shifted her hips just a bit, indicating for Harley to take some initiative, which she gratefully latched onto. Harley dragged Ivy’s leggings down her form, kissing the skin of her legs as she exposed inch after inch. Pamela’s thong left little to the imagination, she was certain. Still, Harley gasped when it was removed as though she was surprised.

            With the way she was staring at Ivy, Ivy had expected her to go right to town, eating her out with as much enthusiasm as she might go at tasting a new dessert. Instead, she kissed Ivy, just briefly, and giggled, before raising herself up as Ivy had done. She rested her hips against Ivy’s, shifting them down just slightly as Harley took Ivy’s hands in hers, not so much pinning them beside Pamela’s head as she was just…holding them. Somehow, the contact, so demure, sent a flush through Ivy’s entire body.

            “Just you and me, Red,” Harley beamed, nuzzling her nose against Ivy’s cheek, “you and me, against the world.”

            They came together, and Ivy wrapped her legs and arms around Harley tightly, dragging the girl with her as she rolled to the side. They held each other as if they were the only two in the world as they sensations brought them up and up, and their high finally subsided.

            After a moment, they pulled back, breathing heavily as they stared into each other, before the euphoria gave way to giggles. Harley kissed Ivy’s face over and over, probably covering the whole surface twice before sinking into her, holding her tight and burrowing her face against her chest.

            And then the muffled sound of the _I Love Lucy_ theme song played through the room. In her post love-making haze, it took Ivy a moment to figure out what it was, but the expression on Harley’s face choked off the laughter inside of her chest.

            “It’s Joker,” she whispered, “that’s his ringtone.”


	5. Bartering for Affection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trouble ahead.

            To say the next few days were a blur would be equivocal to insinuating Batman had a moderately-sized ego; quite the understatement. There was hardly a moment where Harley and Ivy were not pressed together, either innocently clinging for touch or consumed in a haze of lovemaking. Where Ivy went so did Harley, and where Harley went Ivy was tugged along. The shocking part was that Ivy couldn’t complain.

            Much.

            “Harl,” Ivy drawled, examining the stamen of a new breed of hibiscus she crafted herself, “I’m sure this would be much easier done some other way…”

            “Hm?” Harley remarked lazily. “What way’s that, Red?”

            “Well, perhaps,” Ivy shifted forward toward the desk, “if I had the chair to myself, and weren’t in your lap.”

            “But, _Red_ ,” she drew out the nickname as she often did these days, both in and out of the sheets, “it’s so much more fun this way!”

            Harley spun the swivel chair in a 360 for emphasis. Ivy’s eyes went to the ceiling; she knew Harley’s game by now. After all, she’d done this for the past two weeks. First, hogging the shower, then snatching a book out of Ivy’s hand, and even going to feed Ivy with a fork before stealing the bite away. All very bratty, childish things which Harley most certainly was not able to pull on Joker and get away with it. Ivy was willing to let her favorite jester indulge in her playful antics and, in doing so, Ivy found herself reveling in her own indulgences, or rather, a lack thereof.

            Ivy was used to immediate satisfaction, and not even in the sexual sense. She was, in a word, beautiful. Beautiful things inspired softness and compliance in others; thus was the way of man. Without pheromones, without powers, the world would still bend on knee for her, though admittedly in humbler fashion. But Harley was different. Though not immune to Ivy’s good looks—as if anyone could be—it was becoming apparent to the former botanist that they didn’t sway Harley in the least.

            When she had hogged the shower, Ivy tried to coax her way in with steamy promises of lustful delights. When Harley invited her to join her, it turned out all she wanted was to lay her arms around Ivy’s waist, and demurely rest her face in her neck. She said she was lonely. When she pulled the novel out of Ivy’s grasp, Ivy responded as she thought necessary: with half-lidded eyes, parted lips, and a jutted out chest. She was preparing to make her voice as husky as possible just as Harley snorted and kissed her nose, trotting away. By the time Harley offered her fork only to draw it back, Ivy knew what she was up to.

            She was bartering for affection, and Ivy was unaccustomed to being on the receiving end of a tease.

            Ivy turned in the chair and carded that fine blonde hair with her fingers. Harley went red in the cheeks at the touch, and there were few sights in this world that pleased Ivy more.

            “Five more minutes. We’ll head inside and get the wool blanket you like and listen to the stereo.”

            Harley snorted, her eyes growing distant. “Ya just wanna drill me to jazz music again.”

            “Don’t be vulgar,” Ivy warned mildly. “Something on your mind?”

            Harley shook her head, her pigtails bobbing around her face. Her black eye was healing nicely. “You locked up my phone real good, just like I asked, right?”

            Ivy exhaled softly through her nose. She had asked this question at least a dozen times a day since the phone was stowed away. But this was only about the tenth time she’d asked today, and the day was nearly over. It was a small victory. She thought of the night Joker had called, how the ringtone had repeated again and again, like an angry fist bashing at a door. Her wrist still had five perfectly crescent-shaped cuts from where Harley had held on tightly to her, as though afraid of being whisked away against her will.

            “Right?” Harley pushed forward.

            “It’s hidden somewhere safe, Harl, just like you asked me to do.”

            “Thank you,” Harley leant up, and kissed Ivy with such tenderness it was as if it were a first kiss all over again. “C’mon, let’s go inside. I wanna show ya how to make a cake in a mug.”

* * *

 

            It was as if Ivy knew what had happened before it happened, almost like she had dreamt it.

            She awoke to a cold bed, the far side now uncharacteristically empty. Her hand rested on the cool sheet for a long moment before she gathered her strength to kick aside that internal urge to leave well enough alone, to go blissfully oblivious until the very last moment. If a bomb were about to detonate, it would be easier to sit back and allow the moments to tick on, instead of reaching in and pulling the wrong wire and getting yourself killed that much faster.

            The sight of Harley standing barefoot in her kitchen, covered in soil from the greenhouse, her dirty ziplocked cell phone in hand, the other holding the strap of a bag, didn’t surprise Ivy in the least. But she wished it did.

            “I have to g—”

            “No you don’t.”

            Tears cut through the dirt on Harley’s cheeks. The expression on her face was that of contorted hatred, but at what, Ivy was unsure.

            “What’s in the bag, Harl?” Ivy asked, despite almost certainly knowing the answer.

            “I have to bring him somethin’,” Harley swiped her hand against her sniffling nose. “Else he won’t take me back.”

            “So, you intend to rob me?” The sentence was weightier than Ivy liked; robbed of possessions and affection. Her heart felt as though it was being pillaged, and Harley was bleeding her dry of anything valuable wherein, and Ivy already had so little to give.

            “…I’ll pay ya back…”

            “No.” Ivy folded her arms. “No, you won’t ever pay me back, not for this; you’ll never be able to repay me for what you’re going to do. Betrayal has no monetary value, Harley Quinn.”

            “I have to go back, Red!” She locked eyes with Ivy’s, the bloodshot red from her tears made them impossibly blue. “We can’t be apart. I _tried_. I thought if I couldn’t talk to him I’d be okay, but I’m not, I’m _worse_ , I’m so bad, I’m awful and I’m miserable. And wanna know what’s fucked up? I know exactly why, but knowin’ don’t mean shit. I know I’m having withdrawal, I _know_ I’m having a psychotic break! But it won’t stop! My brain is on fire and running around in circles! I’m dying! I’m dying here! And you’re—”

            “Really?” Ivy asked softly. “I’m killing you?”

            “ _Yes!_ ” Harley headed toward the door, but Ivy blocked her way. “I’m leaving no matter what ya do, Red.”

            “He stole all your stuff,” Ivy began heatedly. “He locked you in a room! He left you to _die_ in his own toxic gas! _HE BEATS YOU!_ ”

            Harley winced. “Don’t matter. None of it matters. Nothing matters, Red, and I sure as hell don’t. And you’re gonna let me go.”

            “Why?” Ivy demanded, pushing her back to the door. “Why would I do that? I could keep you here forever.” Vines crept along the sides of the walls, moving from the potted plants in the corner, and they wrapped around Harley’s ankles, holding her firmly to the floor. “I could end your life, right here and now. The price of stealing from me, crossing me, is high.”

            “You won’t do that, Red.”

            “No?”

            “No,” Harley shook her head, “because you love me.”

            The shock that sank into Ivy was just the pause Harley needed to free herself of the vines. Harley’s hand on the knob, Ivy seized hold of Harley by the shoulders and pinned her to the wall, kissing her roughly. Harley kissed her back, her hands gripped roughly in Ivy’s hair, her lips salted with her tears.

            “Pamela,” Harley panted when they parted, “nice try, but you’ve given me all my shots remember? You can’t control me no more than you can kill me.”

            Ivy covered her mouth with her hands, eyes wide and legs shaking, realizing what she had done—she had used her kiss as a weapon toward Harley.

            “I was kiddin’, ya know,” Harley laughed sadly. “I know you’d never love me.”

            Watching the door shut behind Harley was like watching a fist soaring through the air before it made contact with your own face.

            _You idiot_ , a voice inside Ivy growled, a deep and primal voice that propelled Poison Ivy apart from Pamela Isley day by day. _YOU FOOL YOU FOOL YOU FOOL!_

            Pamela pushed the voice down, pushed Poison Ivy into the dust, and flung open the door, rushing into the night after Harley. The air was so cold it bit into her skin, filled her lungs with searing ache; the freezing concrete hurt her bare feet to the bone. How had Harley gotten so far ahead? How long had Pamela waited, like always, to act on her feelings? That head of blonde hair rounded the sidewalk corner, toward the busier streets of Gotham.

            “H…” Ivy panted, drawing in a deeper breath to call after her. “Harley!”

            Blonde pigtails whipped in the wind as Harley reflexively turned toward the sound of her name. She jolted, and without hesitating charged into the street, weaving between speeding cars as she went. She slid across the hood of an idle taxi, landing on the other side. The cab sped off, and Ivy half-expected Harley to be gone. But there she stood, panting and wide-eyed on the opposite side of the street. The passing cars broke up the scene in pieces:

            Harley’s face scrunched up. Tears flowed anew. She mouthed two words. She turned. She ran. And she was gone.

            Ivy fell back against the wall of the building behind her, her head in her hands. Over and over, the memories of the last two weeks whirled around her, consuming her. The smell of Harley’s hair, the feeling of the skin at the small of her back, the laugh she nearly choked on whenever she told a joke. The two words she shaped with her mouth before disappearing from Ivy’s life once more.

            _I’m sorry_.

            The memories so consumed Ivy that she hadn’t noticed the stranger on her stoop until she stood at the base. She was pretty, in a severe sort of way. Her sense of style was dark and angled, her black hair cropped fashionably short in a way that framed the green eyes that gleamed in the streetlamps.

            “Whoa,” the stranger remarked, “you look like shit.”

            “I don’t have time for this,” Ivy growled.

            “Do you live here?” The woman stared up at the dark townhouse. “Not exactly the sort of base of operations I’d expect from Poison Ivy.”

            Like many of the patients at Arkham, Ivy’s identity wasn’t secret. Anyone who knew she was Poison Ivy also knew she was Pamela Isley, former botanist turned eco-terrorist, a protector of the Green. The only secret Ivy had to herself was where she resided, and her cover had just been blown.

            “I tailed Pigtails here a couple weeks ago. She was a bit, how you say, distraught when we parted ways. I wanted to check in on her, see if she’s okay.”

            “Just who are you?”

            “To Harley, or in general?”

            Ivy fought against the screaming in her chest, forcing herself to throw up a façade of steely neutrality. “Both.”

            “No worries, eggplant,” the woman smirked, “I’m not out to steal her heart. We hardly know each other. She just makes an impression on you, which I’m sure you’re aware of.”

            “And you are…?”

            “Catwoman.” The woman answered flatly. “And that’s a secret you’d better take to your grave.”

            Ivy would have rolled her eyes had it not been for the feeling of needles slowly pressing into her heart. She was at a breaking point, ready to burst, and this woman, Catwoman, stood in her way.

            “She isn’t here.”

            Catwoman arched her brow. “She told me she didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

            “She lied.” The words held so much weight to them. “Harley lies all the time. To herself, to others; it’s how she survives.”

            “Mm,” Catwoman glanced down at Ivy’s bare feet. “Where is she, then?”

            “Don’t have a clue. Not here. Maybe back with him. To hell with her. I can’t care anymore.”

            “To him?” She repeated. “To Joker? And you just _let_ her go? Isn’t he her abuser?!”

            “He’s what she wants. I can’t stop her.”

            “Did you even try?”

            “ _OF COURSE I TRIED!_ ” Ivy burst out, hands flung out in fists at her sides. “But I’m finished! I’m done! Through! I can’t care anymore, not when she—she—”

            No, Ivy was not going to cry, not in front of anyone, much less a nosy stranger who didn’t know how to leave well enough alone.

            “So you’re just giving up?” Catwoman paused, and spat out a bitter chuckle. “Coward. I’ll find her myself. I’ll talk some sense into her, but don’t expect her to come back here. Not to a woman who won’t even fight to keep her around. Some friend you are, Pamela. Some friend.”

            _Yeah,_ Ivy thought darkly as Selina shouldered past her, _some friend, Pamela. Some friend_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's all I've been commissioned for so far. If you'd like to commission me to finish, I'd do that *finger guns* but also if I just get enough of a response, I'll write a next chapter to bring it all together. Maybe two, because I can be long-winded. Let me know.


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